When
Ralph Nader announced he would run for President in 2000, few people
thought he would register very high on the political Richter scale.
Now, in the wake of an election so close that some Gore supporters blame
the Presidency of George W. Bush on Nader's siphoning of would-be votes
for Al Gore, the Green Party has become a household name.

Democrats and Republicans across the country are trying to come to terms
with the unwanted stepchild of modern American politics: a third party
with teeth. But will Ralph Nader's role in election 2000 mark a watershed
event for the Green Party, or the beginning of its demise?

Nader,
on the ballot in 44 states, attracted only 2.7 percent of the national
vote -- about two percent less than needed to qualify the Green Party
for matching federal campaign funds in future elections. But the consumer
advocate famous for a lifetime of campaigning for product safety and
corporate responsibility did draw more than five percent of the vote
in 10 states, including six percent in Massachusetts, Montana and Hawaii,
seven percent in Vermont and a whopping 10 percent in Alaska.

And
240 Green Party candidates running for almost every kind of political
office made it onto 43 state ballots -- almost double the number in
1996. Only 20 of them won, but the gain in recognition was a victory
in itself, party leaders say. "A new day is dawning in America
politically," Nader told a crowd of supporters in Rhode Island
a few weeks after the election. "It's a long trip ... but not an
impossible one."

The
media lambasted Nader for playing a spoiler role. "One of the saddest
sights in politics is a fading public figure who refuses to concede
that his or her time has passed," wrote Hearst columnist Marianne
Means. David Bennett, a history professor at Syracuse University, wrote
in Montana's Billings Gazette that Nader not only stymied Gore's campaign,
but he also disgraced himself and the party he represented. Because
of Nader, he wrote, "the Green Party has no future as a serious
political organization in America."

Even
some prominent environmentalists like the Earth Day Network's Denis
Hayes, fearful that Bush could do extensive damage to hard-won environmental
protections, called Nader's campaign "a horrible mistake."

Anti-Naderisms
such as these are enough to make a Green turn red. True democracy is
about voting for the candidates one believes in, they say, not settling
for a lesser evil. And when almost three million people cast their ballots
for Nader, they weren't only voting for the man, they were sending a
message: We're disillusioned with corporatized American politics, and
we deserve something better.

That
sentiment, say some political analysts and Green Party leaders, is likely
only to grow stronger during George W. Bush's Presidency.

As
veteran Greens will tell you, the Green Party is not the Nader Party,
and even those few who withdrew their support for Nader are likely to
back Green candidates running for other offices in the future. Green
Mike Feinstein, elected mayor of Santa Monica in November, says any
anti-Nader backlash is "just a historical blip on the screen."
He adds that the influx of new Greens outweighs the voters turned off
by the party's role in the election.

Annie
Goeke, co-chair of the Association of State Green Parties and a 2000
candidate for auditor-general of Pennsylvania, agrees. She expects the
party to continue to attract broader support, especially from minorities,
labor, students and other demographic groups that have expressed high
dissatisfaction with the political status quo. "The people who
are involved with the Green Party feel as though they are participants
in it," she says.

On
November 7, Heritage and 2.7 million other Nader voters made the Green
Party the largest third party in the United States, usurping the fractious
and faltering Reform Party, mostly due to Nader's high-profile campaign.
The party's emphasis on issues ranging from corporate welfare reform
and universal health care to logging in national forests attracted disillusioned
Democrats, first-time or reborn voters drawn in from the sidelines,
veteran Greens, and, of course, environmentalists.

But
party leaders say some of its biggest victories were won at the local
level. Despite their underdog status as both third-party candidates
and as fundraisers, Greens managed a respectable showing in several
races and won a few high-profile ones as well. In all, 79 Greens now
hold elected office in 21 states, making the Green presence in American
politics the strongest it has ever been.

That
presence is especially strong in California. Larry Robinson was re-elected
mayor of Sebastopol, 50 miles north of San Francisco, and two new Greens
on its City Council have produced the only Green Party majority in the
country. Matt Gonzalez was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors,
and Feinstein was elected mayor of Santa Monica. Medea Benjamin's campaign
for U.S. Senate -- although unsuccessful -- generated considerable interest
among progressives throughout the state.

Feinstein
says the party made great strides in 2000, and the Greening of America
may not be far behind. "We've developed a substantially larger
activist and fundraising base," Feinstein says. "The Green
Party is stronger than ever."

Goeke
says the party's biggest challenge right now is to keep the momentum
going. She points to the quick rise and fall of the Reform Party as
a lesson in how to squander post-election third party potential. "It
proves that you have to have strong grassroots across the country,"
she says. "It's very important that we build correctly and strongly,
that we're a true grassroots party."

Feinstein
agrees: "What we need to do is continue to work on sensible, unglamorous
day-to-day strategies that are winning us local races and gaining members."
In five years, Feinstein hopes to see at least 200 Greens holding elected
office throughout the country, public financing of elections and proportional
representation on the local level.

Nader,
who says that "party-building" was one of his objectives in
the campaign, also predicts a groundswell of two-party-busting support
for local, state and federal Green Party candidates in 2002.

But
will the man Life magazine named one of the 100 most influential people
of the 20th century run again in 2004, at age 70? Too soon to tell,
say the Greens. "He hasn't told us directly if he wants to run,"
says Goeke.